20.
AURORA VALEN?A
Tomás was discharged at six forty in the evening.
The doctor repeated the instructions three times.
I listened to all of them.
Then asked him to repeat them once more.
Dante remained silent beside me, holding the bag containing the medication and documents.
Elisa and Cecília were at Mrs. Lurdes’s house.
Tomás appeared recovered enough to complain about the bandage where the IV had been inserted.
“Want off.”
“At home,” I said.
“Now.”
“The nurse needs to remove it.”
“She’s mean.”
“She took care of you.”
“Daddy stabbed too.”
Dante crouched.
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t forgive.”
“That’s all right.”
Tomás thought.
“Later.”
“All right.”
Outside, Dante opened the rear door.
He placed Tomás in the car seat and checked the harness twice.
I watched him.
His hands were steady now.
But I had seen how pale he became while telling me about the epinephrine.
I had seen the fear.
Dante had not been calm because he felt nothing.
He had been calm despite what he felt.
“I’ll drive,” I said.
“Your car is still in S?o Bartolomeu.”
“I can drive yours.”
“You spent hours trying to get back.”
“And you spent hours at the hospital.”
“I’m not tired.”
“You are.”
“So are you.”
Tomás kicked the seat.
“I drive.”
We both looked at him.
“No,” we answered simultaneously.
He laughed.
The tension eased for one instant.
Dante took the wheel.
On the way, I called Marta.
The teacher cried while explaining that another child had offered Tomás the cookie before anyone realized it.
“We reviewed all the instructions,” she said. “He knew he couldn’t accept food, but…”
“He is three,” I answered.
I could blame her.
I could blame the school.
Blame myself for not reinforcing the rule enough.
Blame Dante for not knowing sooner.
The entire world.
But Tomás was alive.
“We’ll speak tomorrow,” I said.
“Of course.”
I ended the call.
“You’re angry,” Dante said.
“I am.”
“At whom?”
“Everyone.”
“Including me?”
I looked at him.
“No.”
The answer came effortlessly.
Dante kept his eyes on the road.
“I should know more about his allergy.”
“You knew what you needed to know.”
“I didn’t know how to use the pen.”
“You used it.”
“With instructions.”
“That is how people learn during an emergency.”
“I could have made a mistake.”
“You didn’t.”
His hands tightened on the wheel.
“When he coughed, I thought…”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
“I do, Dante.”
My voice softened.
“I spent years thinking that every time Tomás turned blue from crying, every time a monitor sounded, every time he took too long to wake up. I know exactly what your mind did.”
Dante inhaled deeply.
“How did you endure it?”
“There was no choice.”
The same answer I had given him about the surgery.
He nodded.
“This time there was,” I said.
“What?”
“A choice.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You could have left the school to handle it. You could have called an employee. You could have panicked.”
“He is my son.”
“Yes.”
The word remained between us.
Not biologically.
Not only on paper.
Dante had been a father when he administered epinephrine while Tomás begged for me.
A father when he explained to Cecília that I would return.
A father when he chose not to separate the siblings without thinking.
A father when he called Mrs. Lurdes because he understood he could not be in two places at once.
I did not need to acknowledge it aloud.
But I acknowledged it inside myself.
We arrived home.
Elisa opened the door before Mrs. Lurdes could stop her.
“T?mas!”
“I’m alive,” he announced.
The girls surrounded him.
Cecília touched his face.
“You died?”
“No.”
“Almost?”
“Daddy stabbed me.”
“Stop saying it like that,” Elisa said. “It sounds like he killed you.”
“He didn’t.”
“Then it’s done.”
Mrs. Lurdes came toward me.
“He’s all right?”
“He is.”
She embraced me.
“And you?”
“Me too.”
A lie.
My body still trembled inside.
Dante placed the bag on the table.
“The doctor instructed us to observe him overnight.”
“I know.”
“I can stay.”
I looked at him.
The offer came without pressure.
Without saying I needed him.
Without insistence.
“You don’t need to.”
“I know.”
The children spoke simultaneously.
Elisa wanted to see the bandage.
Cecília asked whether the allergy could spread to her.
Tomás wanted food.
“I can stay,” Dante repeated. “Not sleep here. Stay until they fall asleep. If there is any sign of a reaction, I’ll take all of you to the hospital.”
I wanted to say no.
The word was ready.
But the memory of the road without signal returned.
The broken car.
The failing call.
The certainty that he would appear.
“Until they’re asleep,” I allowed.
Dante nodded.
“All right.”
Mrs. Lurdes prepared soup.
Tomás rejected it because it contained carrots.
Then accepted when Dante blended everything and called it “soup without pieces.”
Elisa spoke for twenty minutes about how she had helped care for her brother by watching him breathe.
My heart tightened.
“Did Daddy Dante ask you to?” I asked.
Dante answered before she could.
“For several seconds. I realized it was too much responsibility and corrected myself.”
“I watched anyway,” Elisa said.
“You stayed near him,” I told her. “That was enough.”
Cecília did not leave Dante’s side.
She held two of his fingers while eating.
Perhaps because he was the person who had remained when I was absent.
After their baths, I put all three to bed.
Tomás fell asleep first.
Exhaustion overcame him before the second story.
Cecília refused to close her eyes.
“If I sleep, he gets sick again.”
“Sleeping does not cause allergies,” I explained.
“But I can’t see.”
“Mommy will watch.”
“And Daddy?”
Dante was sitting near the door.
“I’ll watch too until I leave.”
“Don’t go.”
“After all of you fall asleep.”
Her eyes filled.
“Wake up and you disappeared.”
The words were quiet.
Dante remained still.
“I will say goodbye before leaving.”
“But I’ll be sleeping.”
“I can leave a note with your mother.”
“I can’t read.”
“She will read it to you.”
Cecília thought.
“Draw rock.”
“I will.”
“And moon.”
“That too.”
She accepted.
Elisa lifted her head.
“Draw me.”
“You too.”
“And T?mas.”
“All three.”
“And Mommy.”
Dante looked at me.
“If she allows me.”
“You may draw me,” I said.
The children slowly closed their eyes.
We remained silent.
When all three breaths became regular, Dante stood.
“Where is there paper?”
I gave him a sheet and pencil.
He sat at the small table.
He could not draw.
That became obvious very quickly.
The moon resembled a banana.
The stones were circles.
The children’s figures had arms emerging from their heads.
“It is terrible,” I murmured.
“I know.”
“Elisa will say so.”
“I know.”
“Tomás will insist he is the largest figure.”
“Probably.”
Dante drew a fourth person.
Then stopped.
“You,” he explained.
The figure had long hair and a triangular dress.
“I don’t wear dresses like that.”
“It’s the only kind I know how to draw.”
“It looks like a bell.”
“I can erase it.”
“No.”
The answer escaped me.
Dante raised his eyes.
“Leave it.”
He drew himself slightly away from the others.
I watched.
“Why are you so far away?”
“Because I still am.”
My chest tightened.
“Cecília asked for all five.”
“She asked me to draw you. She didn’t say I had to stand with you.”
“Dante.”
“What?”
“Put yourself closer.”
He looked at me for too long.
“It’s only a drawing,” I said.
“I know.”
He moved his figure closer.
Not beside me.
Near Tomás.
As though he still needed to enter through fatherhood before reaching any other place.
Dante left the paper on the bedside table.
Then approached Tomás’s bed.
He touched his forehead.
Watched him breathe.
“It’s normal,” I said.
“I know.”
“Will you check again?”
“Probably.”
“You need to go.”
“All right.”
We walked into the kitchen.
Mrs. Lurdes had already returned home.
The studio was dark.
Dante picked up his keys.
“Thank you,” I said.
He stopped.
“You already thanked me.”
“Not enough.”
“I don’t want thanks for caring for him.”
“It isn’t only about Tomás.”
Dante waited.
“You cared for the girls too. You thought of everything.”
“Not everything.”
“Enough.”
He lowered his gaze.
“I was terrified.”
“I know.”
“I almost called you before using the pen.”
“You would have lost time.”
“That was what I thought.”
“You thought correctly.”
The silence grew heavy.
The memory of the embrace at the hospital rose between us.
My body still remembered the firmness of his arms.
The instant I had allowed it.
“Aurora…”
“Don’t mention the embrace.”
He closed his mouth.
“It was fear.”
“I know.”
“It means nothing beyond that.”
“I know.”
“Stop saying you know.”
“All right.”
The response almost made me smile.
I did not.
Dante opened the door.
“Call if he coughs, becomes red, vomits, or appears different.”
“I know the instructions.”
“I know.”
I looked at him.
“Leave before I regret thanking you.”
“Good night.”
“Good night.”
He left.
I closed the door.
When I returned to the bedroom, Cecília was awake.
“He left?”
“He did.”
Her eyes filled.
I picked up the drawing.
“He left this.”
She sat up.
“Ugly moon.”
“Very.”
“This is me?”
“I think so.”
“Daddy is here.”
She pointed to the figure near the others.
“He is.”
Cecília hugged the paper.
“He comes tomorrow?”
“We didn’t arrange it.”
She looked sad.
I thought about the day.
The hospital.
The road.
The way Dante acted without waiting for recognition.
I picked up my telephone.
You may come tomorrow at eight. Tomás will remain home.
His reply appeared immediately.
I’ll be there.
No celebration.
No questions.
Only presence.
I lay between the beds.
Tomás breathed normally.
Elisa slept with her mouth open.
Cecília held the drawing.
For the first time, when I thought about Dante arriving the following morning, I did not feel only fear.
I felt relief.
And that was much more dangerous.